Chronic Pain

Scientists have proved what so many have long suspected: The very presence of your solicitous spouse can be a pain. By eavesdropping on electrical activity in the most private precincts of the mind, researchers investigating the effects of chronic pain discovered that a husband or wife can make the ache feel three times worse simply by being in the room. All they had to do to make their spouses feel better, the neural probes revealed, was leave.

Re "Grocer may bid U.S. 'cheerio,'" March 21 The Times' evident bias against Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is intriguing. Why in a story about Fresh & Easy do we hear only from the chain's naysayers - including the founder of Trader Joe's, a pro-Trader Joe's analyst and a pro-Trader Joe's customer? Where are the interviews with Fresh & Easy customers? The article ends by quoting one person who says, "I don't know anybody that goes to Fresh & Easy. " Here's a clue: Go to a store and you'll find us. I am one customer who will be disappointed if Fresh & Easy closes, as I've found products that often exceed my expectations.

People who say they are less sensitive to pain than others could be right. Researchers say they have found a gene that appears to affect how people feel discomfort. Tests in rats showed that blocking increased activity of the gene after nerve injury or inflammation could prevent the development of chronic pain, a finding that points to possible ways to develop new pain drugs.

Antidepressants are being used increasingly to help patients with various health problems.

Apain in the back has plagued Dolores Kurzhals of Van Nuys for seven years. She can't sit for more than 20 minutes at a time and she had to give up her job as a secretary at an engineering firm after two disk surgeries. She is now on disability and gets depressed about not being as active as she once was. So when she heard about an experiment that studies people with chronic pain and depression, she offered to help.

The treatment of hospital patients for acute temporary pain and chronic pain from terminal illness is often "inadequate and insufficient" because of misplaced concern about possible addiction or side effects, while outpatients suffering from other kinds of chronic pain are often overmedicated to the point of addiction, a federal advisory panel concluded Wednesday.

The sunny fact that Americans are living longer, more productive lives has a dark side: More of us than ever live with chronic illnesses that are not only a drag on sufferers' time and energy, but on the nation's pocketbook. The Institute of Medicine on Tuesday put a dollar figure on the cost of caring for chronic illness in the United States--$1.5 trillion yearly, fully three-fourths of annual healthcare spending. A panel of experts called on policymakers to do more to prevent and track the big nine chronic diseases that most drain the nation's wallet.

People with fibromyalgia suffer from chronic pain throughout the body, especially in their joints, muscles and tendons. But research shows that exercise can make patients feel better and improve their quality of life. Dr. Ginevra Liptan, an authority on the disorder at the Oregon Health Sciences Center, has conducted research on how a type of massage therapy of the fascia tissue -- the connective tissue surrounding muscles -- can help relieve discomfort. To find out more about the therapy and how exercise and fibromyalgia are linked, join a live Web chat Monday at 11 a.m. PDT (1 p.m. CDT, 2 p.m. EDT)

Nausea, stomach bleeding, heart disease and more: The list of potential dangers from taking over-the-counter pain medications is lengthy. One of the most recent findings, published in January in the journal BMJ, formerly the British Medical Journal, looked at results from 31 trials that included more than 116,000 people. It found that ibuprofen use tripled the risk of stroke, even though overall risks were still small. For ibuprofin and other so-called nonsteroidal anti-imflammatories (NSAIDs)

Imagine a sharp, endless toothache, and you still have no idea how much chronic pain hurts. But no one gripes or grimaces at this meeting of the American Chronic Pain Assn. Spinal braces, foam cushions and canes carried into the meeting room at St. Jude's Catholic Church in Westlake are the only visible clues that the 17 members here are suffering. On the first and third Tuesdays of each month, they gather to talk of lives and careers shattered by nonstop pain.